Costs of Proceedings Commenced in High Court Which Could Have Been Commenced in County Court

Part of Clause 4 – in the House of Commons am 12:00 am ar 20 Hydref 1969.

Danfonwch hysbysiad imi am ddadleuon fel hyn

Photo of Sir Ian Percival Sir Ian Percival , Southport 12:00, 20 Hydref 1969

I beg to move Amendment No. 3, in page 2, line 33, at end insert: (d) after paragraph (b) of that subsection there shall be inserted the following paragraph:—(c) in this subsection "costs of the action" means the costs incurred up to and including the obtaining of judgment and does not mean or include the costs of executing judgment and a plaintiff who executes in the High Court the judgment which he has obtained shall be entitled to the costs of such execution on the appropriate High Court Scale'. I wish to strip this Amendment of its technicalities in the same way as I think I was able to strip the last one of its technicalities, although I see no way of achieving that.

The point we are considering is this. Section 47, or the operative part of it, refers throughout to the costs of the action and says that in certain circumstances a party shall not have the costs of the action on any scale higher than the county court scale.

During our discussion of the Bill, the question arose whether the costs of execution are the same as the costs of the action. I suspect that the Solicitor-General will tell us that there is no doubt about it and that those who have been worrying need not have worried. Our purpose in moving the Amendment is to make as sure as one can that those who have been worried about it are not worried hereafter.

I believe that the Amendment does no more than recite the law as it stands at the moment, and certainly its purpose is so to do. I say that because I have had the benefit of seeing a letter written by the permanent secretary to the Lord Chancellor to the president of the Under-Sheriffs' Association, following a discussion at which this point was considered by those gentlemen, in which the permanent secretary said, I understand, that the position in law was as set out in the Amendment, namely, that costs of the action do not include costs of execution.

Thus, albeit that the party may, because of Section 47(1), not be entitled to any of the costs of the action because he proceeded in the High Court in a case in which the amount was less than £100, even so he will be entitled to the costs of execution on the High Court scale, because the costs of execution are not costs of the action.

I understand that to be the proposition of law as set out in the letter to which I have referred. I see the learned Solicitor-General looking in a certain direction, and I think that that is exactly what the letter says. I am not sure whether the hon. and learned Gentleman agrees or disagrees, or whether he wishes to intervene.